Injecting the album with plenty of soul, gospel and throwbacks to that old-school Motown sound, producers like the Neptunes, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis and guests like Eve help round out what's possibly the best R&B album this year.

This is smart, literate stuff painted on a rich canvas of pedal steel, ukulele, upright bass, strings and soft drums.

It's so predictable and so painfully trendy that More Than a Woman might as well have a former Mouseketeer's face on the cover.

Some Girls dishes out dirty, greasy rock 'n' roll that doesn't sacrifice mood for hooks.

Having scored a minor hit with a track that appeared on the Kids soundtrack, the group now has a big-label deal and a hip new style--still recognizably moody and tentative, but with enough down-tempo beats and electronic knob-tweaking to drift into trip-hop territory.

The overall psychedelic mood works wonders for any self-respecting fan of the Beach Boys and David Bowie.

It's not exactly a convincing change of gears, nor is it particularly groundbreaking--unless you consider jamming as many four-letter words as possible into three minutes (on "As I Come Back") novel.

An hour-long dream-pop kiss that floats by on a bed of brushed drums, lilting Hawaiian guitars and whispered vocals.

This collection of quirky tunes is largely directionless, with Gough's indistinct voice sounding lost and uncertain in a swell of pianos, strings and horn arrangements.

Their whisper-thin, doo-wop harmonies, fuzzy guitars and barely-there percussion make the Strokes seem like Led Zeppelin. But that's not a bad thing.

The songs don't exactly have the stripped-down demo feel Harrison intended--but mercifully aren't as over-glossed as those on his last solo album, 1987's Cloud Nine.

Country's biggest commodity takes the easy way out with a meticulously picked and produced batch of tunes (see: safe) that would be impossible to screw up.

An album that is as lovely as it is seductive.

If you're not already into it, you're not missing much.

This could have been groundbreaking once upon a time, but there's nothing really new here and only a few songs ever rise above sheer novelty value.

For hard-core fans, there's a wealth of rare gems here.

This album contains just eight tracks--but each one of them is a testament to the unshakable power of the group.

Someone get this woman some drama, pronto.

Walk isn't groundbreaking as much as typical Tori Amos--a dramatic menagerie of atmospheric tracks filled with manic piano, morose characters and so many literary allusions you'll need CliffsNotes to figure 'em out.

Bluesy, fragile and gorgeous.

The disc is made up mostly by mid-tempo classic rockers and sweet nothing ballads. Disappointing? Well, yes.

Most of these songs are just as good, if not better, than the ones that actually made the cut.

The Back Room is a fine album that proves you can look backward while paving the way forward.

Though not as immediate as some of her past mainstream work, Aaliyah's latest has the smoky temptress slowly working her way through R&B, hip-hop and even slightly techno beats...

Stanley's eloquent, understated and unpretentious folk music is more than up to the challenge of finding its place in a world devoted to teen pop and nü-metal.

Totally depressing and totally engaging.

Snoop sounds as cool as ever with his velvety voice and nodding head keeping the laid-back party going.

The sonic pleasure of the band's languid guitar balladry still pulses, and bassist Britta Phillips adds pleasant Stereolab-y vocals to some tracks, but there isn't much here you haven't heard before from Luna.

Doesn't disappoint.

Kinky, however, gets tangled up when they attempt to rock out in English, and the odd rhymes and dated '80s vibe taint their musical revolution.

[A] thoroughly underwhelming debut, an album that merely paints within the lines already drawn by Pavement and the Pixies.

The surprising thing about this retro rock trio is that it can actually rock.

J5 is hard enough to sample Public Enemy on the standout single "What's Golden" and features two of the best turntablists working today, Cut Chemist and DJ Nu-Mark.

[Stereo] is brimming with expressive, beautifully articulated songs that speak to both sides of his personality.

The best stuff here eschews tradition for sonic rebellion...

[A] balanced mix of streetwise, club-ready and bedroom-bumping cuts.

Elvis Costello is back, bashing and clanging away at what he does best: delivering out vitriolic songs of curdled romance and sodden, soiled dreams.

Tak[es] on the state of global affairs in a way that is both surprisingly direct yet somehow reassuringly weird.

10 mediocre new songs.

Sadly, The Way It Is never quite lives up to the album it could have been.

A welcome return to the group's down-tempo beginnings.

This feather-light affair simply lacks any real memorable tunes.

When Ludacris promised his new album would cover all bases, he wasn't kidding.

Deeper Bruce fans will go ga-ga over the dearth of hits on this collection and twists like "Born in the U.S.A." getting a Nebraska-esque treatment and a great version of "Jungleland." Everyone else will simply love it.

A blur of shouted vocals, tribal drums and scattershot riffs.

A warm serving of elegant late-night ballads that infuse acoustic and pedal-steel guitars with back-porch rhythms and arrangements.

While this sounds mostly like incomplete leftovers, there are a few tasty treats: The lonely guitar of "Knives Out," that dirty beat pulsating under "Pulk/Pull Revolving Doors" and the hypnotic body-ponging of "I Might Be Wrong."

Sounds like a funky offshoot of the Stone Roses, mining blissed-out acid grooves, hypnotic rhythms and the kind of distant, detached vocals that don't sound like vocals at all.

If you've got the time to dig in, Frances the Mute proves a cohesive, intricate and expertly layered experience.

Fundamental is the group's most inspired album in nearly a decade.

Home is a raucous acoustic album that mows through bluegrass and traditional country with a vengeance.

While [Linda's] death hangs over much of Driving Rain, Macca's knack for taking a sad song and making it better means tracks like "Lonely Road," "It Must Have Been Magic," "Your Way" and "Back in the Sunshine" are redemption songs, not exercises in self-pity.

He often riffs for too long, so by the time he's singing to his daughter on "Hailie's Song," you feel the album's nearly 80-minute length.

Part new-wave keyboards, part folky acoustic guitars, the music on More Adventurous is unexpectedly beautiful.

At the end of the day, it's really hard to screw up these songs with that voice--try as he might.

A welcome return.

It's hard to imagine a set of songs that better reflects every phase the group has navigated through its turbulent career.

This is carefully architected to pack arenas.

One man has made a beautifully subtle magic in his bedroom studio--and it will be heard on The O.C. in no time.

Sounds like they had as much fun making it as you're going to have listening to it.

These tunes find him not only reconnecting with his sense of melodic urgency but with his loins, as well.

Krauss is blessed with one of the most coolly beautiful voices on record, and she's often better than her material, which is once again the case here.

At times, he's guilty of doing his best Lenny Kravitz impersonation.... But those moments pass relatively quickly, and he slips back into his stripped-down, socially conscious self--and that's when Harper truly shines.

Here, Grohl consistently puts forth straightforward, stripped-down rock that is neither ironic nor pandering--a fine line between Cheap Trick and cheap tricks.

This disc has a clutch of songs that mix chord-y abandon with raging rock riffs--and a heck of a lot of good times.

So maybe Black Foliage can be a bit self-indulgent and uneven at times (the short connecting tracks that recur throughout the album, for example), but such missteps go along with a brimming imagination that boldly explores the outer limits of rock's subconscious.

Less immediate than their brilliantly untouchable 1998 album Mezzanine, this project is unsettling, uneasy and, okay, sometimes unbearably depressing.

Precise? Yes. But does it work your frustrations out? Only a little.

Lateralus takes the L.A. band over the edge with elongated musical movements that simmer under heavy-duty distortion, Middle Eastern percussion and freakish guitar-and-drum time signatures that will make musical mathematicians (i.e., prog-rock dorks) as excited as the kids in the mosh pit.

Head-smashing songs like "Supermassive Black Hole" and "Invincible" all point to an album that strives to be nothing less than epic. It succeeds.

Let's hope we don't have to wait until 2040 for something else this good.

An album that lacks severely in all areas, including production, direction and inspiration.

He does it all so proficiently, you can't help but want to have the guy hang out in your CD player for awhile.

An arresting mix of the singer's political and personal strife set to a jazzy backbeat.

Happenstance is lush and brooding, the kind of record that makes most sense coming through the headphones late at night.

Are you listening, Quentin Tarantino? Here's the soundtrack to your next movie.

The lyrics seem clumsy, and some of the melodies feel warmed over, and the Carlos Santana-appearing "Illegal" is a total buzzkill. But it's not all a loss.

Instead of making any stupid concessions to her sudden celebrity... the Home girl plays it cool, carrying on with the same smooth vibes that made her a star.

Even if it all sounds pretty much the same as their last few, you'd be unwise to turn a deaf ear to this release.

Granted, Step doesn't have anything as effortlessly flawless as the classic single "Judith" from the band's last album, but it does have a number of songs ("Blue," "The Outsider") that are almost as bombastically beautiful.

Mann's cranky muse is consistently compelling, showcasing both her wry lyrics and terrific melodies.

Songs like "World Wide Suicide" and "Severed Head" even come close to recreating the hard rock thrills of the band's billion-selling debut, Ten.

Simply striking.

This is an eerie meditation on aging, death and the corruption of popular culture.

Skull Ring delivers some truly pumping generation-bridging rock moments.

It's Pulp's contribution on the terrifically revealing "Sliding Through Life on Charm" that really raises a smile...and a little something else.

The band's equally impressive second album grooves with both a Detroit hipster sound and some spacey atmosphere.

And by classics we mean poorly produced electro songs you'll hear once, chuckle and never want to hear again--unless you have a head wound or a Sparks fetish.

Six albums in, Missy's recipe for success is still pretty fresh.

Her third album reins it all in to a more palatable place with traditional R&B production and a healthy dose of funkiness.

While the trippy Scottish foursome's third disc may make a few nods to reality when it incorporates boring things like, you know, choruses and verses, songs like "Assessment" and "Liquid Bird"--all electronic gurgles and off-the-wall vocals--still wave the freak flag.

While a handful of the songs sound derivative, it's hard to resist the tambourine-enhanced exuberance of standout cuts like "Penny on the Train Track" and "I Gotta Move."

Another collection of wise, witty tracks marked by her usual spunky vocal style and slashing slide-guitar work.

This is pleasant, bouncy pop, perfect for the carefree days of summer.

Now You Know is full of the stuff BTS fans love: angular melodies, expansive nods to prog-rock and that droning, nasally voice that makes indie-rock geeks stand up and cheer.

Features only a couple new Em ditties, but they're gems.... Better yet, most of the rest of the disc is made up of solid, original material.

The album quickly reveals itself to be a muddled effort of overproduction and drab lyrics.

Given that this may be your final release, this is no way to say goodbye.